Another mural in the works, by the Muralistas (Robin Gibson, Keith Chong & Sylvia La)
At Culture Yard, Santa Cruz, California
Come see our dragon mural at 10th & Jackson in Oakland’s Chinatown. This mural project was started by Lailan Huen and designed by Thomas Wong. The artist team of Thomas Wong, John Hina (of 808 Urban), Jose Garcia (Peps), Sylvia La, and youth from AYPAL gathered with community members and local business owners on the last day of painting in October, for a commemorative photo.
![Dragon Mural Community Photo](http://www.sylviala.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2012/12/IMG_3615_sm-590x495.jpg)
Photo by Lailan Huen.
Read Oakland Local’s backstory on the mural.
Cinematic Sketch
28th January
I sometimes do quick gestural sketches from cinematic images because the images are already expressive of a certain mood or moment. This is from Wong Kar Wai’s 2046.
Color Mixing Guide
28th January
This is the way I mix colors for portrait painting in oil. This applies more to naturalistic representational portraits. When painting portraits, it is helpful to think about skin tone not as a flat color. If you actually look at the colors present in a person’s face in a certain light at a given moment and from a certain perspective, you realize the many subtle colors that are present. In order to represent the complexity of skin tone, one needs to be able to do a lot of color mixing to have intimate knowledge of how to achieve the subtlest variations in color.
Maturity
27th January
Maturity of work has nothing to do with shows, reviews or the fact that someone happens to like your work. It is the natural fruition that comes with intimacy with your own work and an embrace of all that comes with the commitment to your journey – success, curiosity, pain, boredom, desperation, sadness, disappointment, elation, epiphany, frustration, inspiration, work work work work work. Anything else is ego-illusion. Getting back on that horse myself.